CHICAGO: UAL, the parent company of United Airlines, reported a $537 million first-quarter loss Tuesday due to soaring fuel costs and said it was cutting flights and 1,100 jobs to streamline operations during an “extraordinarily difficult” environment for airlines.

The loss was the biggest since the second-largest U.S. carrier emerged from bankruptcy protection in 2006, and worse than Wall Street expected.

UAL said its nearly 8 percent growth in revenue from the first quarter of 2007 was more than offset by a $618 million jump in fuel costs, which rose nearly 50 percent in a year.

The Chicago-based company said it will cut another $200 million in costs by eliminating 500 salaried and management jobs and 600 union jobs by years end. UAL also said it will cut capacity 9 percent by the fourth quarter, on top of a 5 percent reduction in the fourth quarter of 2007, and take 10 to 15 more narrowbody aircraft out of its operating fleet for a total of 30 to be grounded.

“Although both our revenue performance and our non-fuel cost performance were good this quarter, they were not enough to offset the significant and rapid rise in fuel prices,” the chief executive, Glenn Tilton, said in a message to employees.

Combining with another carrier could be next, especially in the wake of the proposed tie-up of Delta Air Lines and Northwest Airlines. While Tilton did not specifically address talks with Continental Airlines, he did say that consolidation is “one of the changes required to address the gap between where we stand today and profitability and sustainability.”

UALs net loss for the January-through-March quarter amounted to $4.45 per share, compared with a loss a year earlier of $152 million, or $1.32 per share.

Revenue was $4.71 billion, up from $4.37 billion. Analysts were expecting $4.75 billion.

UAL follows the American Airlines parent AMR and Continental Airlines into the red for the quarter because of fuel costs. Southwest Airlines is the only large carrier to have reported a profit so far. Delta and Northwest report first-quarter results on Wednesday, while US Airways Group is to report Thursday.

Among smaller carriers, JetBlue Airways reported an $8 million loss Tuesday that was narrower than expected, as slower growth helped the discount airline keep a lid on its costs despite skyrocketing fuel prices.

Openwave Systems (http://www.businessweek.com/ticker/), dogged by sliding sales and a steady stream of red ink, has nonetheless attracted a suitor. But the communications software and services provider stiff-armed hedge fund http://investing.businessweek.com/research/stocks/snapshot/snapshot.asp?capId=9471328 June 5, recommending that its shareholders reject Harbinger’s partial tender offer for 49% of the company’s common stock. The company also declared a one-time special cash dividend of $100 million.

The news did not go over well on Wall Street, as Openwave shares slid in Nasdaq trading June 5.

Openwave said its directors rejected the unsolicited partial tender offer from two funds controlled by Harbinger to buy 40,389,560 of its shares, or approximately 49% of the total, for $8.30 per share in cash. Harbinger said May 22 that it owns 11,110,000 Openwave shares, or around 13%, and would hold 62% if the offer were completed.

“After careful evaluation, Openwave’s Board unanimously determined that Harbinger’s unsolicited partial tender offer undervalues Openwave and is not in the best interests of the Company and all of our stockholders,” the company said in a June 5 press release.

The company is pressing ahead with its own plans, which it detailed in its June 5 release. The plan calls for annual cost savings of approximately $50 million, primarily through a 20% reduction in its workforce, with restructuring charges of approximately $20 million in the fourth quarter of fiscal year 2007.

The company aims to return to sequential revenue growth in each quarter, cut operating expenses from around $60 million in the third quarter of fiscal 2007 to $45 million per quarter in fiscal 2008, and achieve operating profit of around 10% beginning in mid-fiscal 2009.

The $100 million dividend is the latest move to mollify shareholders. The company said that it had completed a $100 million stock repurchase program in April, and believes that “there may be additional opportunities to return value to stockholders upon the potential divestiture of non-core assets”.

If the tender succeeds, Harbinger plans to launch its own turnaround for Openwave, including the acquisition of privately held http://investing.businessweek.com/research/stocks/snapshot/snapshot.asp?capId=8681958, a provider of mobile VoIP applications to telecommunications service providers, with whom the company has collaborated on a number of products.

“We intend to position Openwave as a leader in the growing converged messaging market through the integration of its existing product portfolio and BridgePort Networks’ complementary solution,” said Harbinger in a May 22 press release.

Harbinger also intends to install BridgePort CEO Mike Mulica as the president and CEO of Openwave if the deal goes through. Perhaps that part didn’t sit well with current Openwave management, especially http://investing.businessweek.com/businessweek/research/stocks/people/person.asp?personId=12221034&symbol=OPWV, who was appointed president and CEO in March after the resignation of David Peterschmidt, who remained on the company’s board.

Openwave and Harbinger have been at it for a while. In late December, Harbinger started a proxy contest to appoint two new members to Openwave’s board at its Jan. 22 annual meeting, made a number of recommendations on the company’s operations, and called for the initiation of a share buyback. Openwave said on Jan. 22 that Harbinger rejected a proposed settlement under which James Zucco would be appointed to the company’s board.

The shares tumbled nearly 17% on June 5 to $8.62 on more than two times their average daily trading volume. The shares have tumbled from their 52-week high of $14.57 reached one year ago, though they’re still above a low of $5.91 reached July 20, 2006.

CIBC World was also unimpressed. The firm cut its rating on Openwave shares on June 5 to underperform from sector perform, according to a Standard & Poor’s MarketScope report. Analyst Shaul Eyal thinks that with prospects of a buyout having dwindled, the worse-case valuation for Openwave could be $5-$6 a share, but Harbinger’s tender offer of $8.30 should provide near-term support. Eyal says the board’s new strategy may be sound, but it suggests “a long, risky road” ahead for the shares.

MONDAY, Jan. 7 (HealthDay News) — Adding to a growing body of evidence that rejects the idea that immunizations boost autism rates, a new study finds no proof that incidences of the disorder dropped after makers of most childhood vaccines stopped using a mercury-based preservative in their products.

Researchers found that autism rates in California continued to rise over the past several years, even though the preservative — known as thimerosal — had vanished from almost all vaccines by 2001.

The study makes clear that “thimerosal cannot be the major cause of autism in California,” said its lead author, Dr. Robert Schechter, medical officer with the Immunization Branch of the California Department of Public Health.

Another expert called the study limited and said it did not prove that vaccines have no connection to autism.

Still, the new research “adds to the body of existing evidence in which there is no causal connection that demonstrates thimerosal is a primary cause” of autism, said Andy Shih, vice president of scientific affairs for Autism Speaks, an advocacy organization.

Thimerosal, a preservative once used in contact lens solutions, was frequently a component of childhood vaccines until around 2000. Today, it’s still used in flu vaccines recommended for infants, but researchers think children are still exposed to much less thimerosal than in the past.

In recent years, some parents have blamed their children’s autism on the preservative, which is derived from mercury; others have accused the parents of creating public panic and threatening the health of children by casting a bad light on routine immunizations.

One government study released in 2007 claimed that thimerosal exposure in the first seven months of life didn’t appear to affect the brain function of children aged 7 to 10, although there was some evidence — perhaps the result of chance — that connected thimerosal to later development of physical tics. Even earlier, an Institute of Medicine report released in 2004 found no evidence supporting a link between thimerosal and autism.

In the new study, published in the January issue of the Archives of General Psychiatry, researchers from the California Department of Public Health examined statistics about children in the state from 1995 through March 2007.

The prevalence of autism among kids aged 3 to 12 grew each year, the researchers discovered after looking at numbers compiled by a state agency that provides services to children with the disorder.

For example, the prevalence among kids born in 1993 was three in 10,000 when they were checked in 1996, compared to 13 per 10,000 among those born in 2003 and checked in 2006.

The highest rate — 4.5 cases per 1,000 births — came among 6-year-olds in 2006 who were born in 2000.

The study authors pointed out that autism rates among kids aged 3 to 5 continued to grow for each birth year after 1999, even though thimerosal use dropped.

Shih said the study methods are “robust,” adding that the authors appeared to address limitations of earlier studies. However, he said, the research “doesn’t address the possibility that there might be a subpopulation who might be particularly vulnerable to a vaccine with thimerosal.”

If just 1 percent to 2 percent of children were especially sensitive to the effect of thimerosal, the study wouldn’t be able to pick it up, he said.

Schechter agreed, saying it was true that the research didn’t address whether thimerosal might cause problems in a small number of cases.

As for a possible link between vaccines and autism, Shih said, “the jury is still out,” especially considering that children are exposed to a large number of vaccines before age 2.

And he added, “Some people in the community feel that they might lead to immune problems that could either exacerbate or lead to autism. All this is purely hypothetical, but this is an area where we need to continue to do more research.”

More information

To learn more about vaccines, visit the «www.cdc.gov».